


A deliberate fake boyfriend trope

by lheadley



Series: A deliberate fake boyfriend trope [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: But not the usual fake boyfriend, M/M, Scott and Stiles are best bros, and that is all, fake boyfriend, sterek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-17
Updated: 2013-07-12
Packaged: 2017-12-15 07:27:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/846896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lheadley/pseuds/lheadley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What?” Scott was defensive. “You agreed Stiles was the best choice to chair BHIP-Co. You wanted someone impartial to make the pack cooperation work.” </p><p>Derek rolled his eyes at the abbreviation. “You were the idiot that bought him the gavel.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A letter of invitation

**Author's Note:**

> See http://torakodragon.tumblr.com/post/78510930797/sure-thing-stiles-turned-and-leapt-at-scott
> 
> For Torakodragon drawing of a scene from chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Allison. How could you ever think there would be anyone but you… you know that you are all there has ever… I mean how could you even….”
> 
> His protestations were quickly cut off as Allison leant in to kiss him.
> 
> “Hey, you are supposed to share now” Stiles said.

The late evening sun was filtering through the large windows of the loft, casting a reddish light over the assembled packs. There was a quiet murmur of conversation. It was not exactly relaxed – more the sound of social small talk amongst acquaintances at a too small cocktail party in a too large venue. Everyone was trying to fill up any moments of silence in the hum of background noise, while consciously striving to be polite. It was a big step up from the tense silence and hostile glowering of the early meetings, and the progress in social interaction held the promise that things would eventually normalise; another year or so, perhaps.

The subdued conversation was interrupted by a fusillade of bangs in rapid succession from the table by the window. Stiles looked around at the members of the two packs.

“Come on… I call this session of the Beacon Hills Inter-Pack Council to order.”

Derek pulled his eyebrows into a solid line of disgruntlement, and glowered in Scott’s general direction.

“What?” Scott was defensive. “You agreed Stiles was the best choice to chair BHIP-Co. You wanted someone impartial to make the pack cooperation work.” 

Derek rolled his eyes at the abbreviation. “You were the idiot that bought him the gavel.” Scott had the good grace to look somewhat abashed at that. Derek made a half-hearted attempt to grab the wooden hammer from Stiles’s grip as he moved past him to his seat. Stiles clasped the gavel to his chest with an indignant squawk.

“Hey… paws off. The gavel speaks to my authority as Chair of BHIP-Co.”

“It speaks to the inability of your alpha to think things through.”

Stiles gave a couple of quick raps with his gavel. “Alpha Hale, you are out of order. No dissing the alpha of the other pack. And no dissing the Chair, either.” 

Derek sighed theatrically and sprawled into his chair. Scott sat opposite, temporarily engrossed with Allison. Or maybe not temporarily – they could go on like that all meeting, and frequently did. Stiles seemed resigned to his inability to bring them to order. The remaining members of the two packs fanned out around them.

“So” Stiles pulled on his glasses. Derek had repeatedly voiced his utter disbelief that he needed them – it was all part of the act. Stiles never wore the glasses on any other occasion, though Danny had once said that ‘nerd Stiles’ was a good look. “So” Stiles continued, pointedly looking round to make sure he had everyone’s attention “Item one, approval of the minutes of the last council?” Stiles pushed his glasses up his nose and looked around the table again. A bored sound of agreement came from around the table, although Lydia merely paused in the midst of her manicure to wave an assenting nail file in Stiles’s general direction.

“Good, good. Item two, alpha McCall has something to communicate. The Chair recognises alpha McCall. You’re up Scotty boy.”

“It’s nothing really.” Scott had managed to tear himself away from gazing at his hands, interlinked with Allison’s. “I just heard from one of the neighbouring packs.”

Derek breathed out through his nose, and seemed to tense. Instinctively his pack seemed to tense with him.

“Heard how?”

“Yeah, Scott, how? Why did you not forward the email to me? You know I am supposed to get all the emails?” Stiles was sounding slightly aggrieved.

“It wasn’t an email bro, it was a letter. And it only came this morning. If I hadn’t been… um… delayed getting over here I would have shown it to you earlier.” 

Scott tossed a heavy cream envelope onto the table. It had been carelessly torn open. Stiles tugged the letter free.

“Fancy….” Stiles sounded impressed as he drew the thick paper with the embossed letterhead. The paper was covered in a slanting handwriting. “Wait, this is from the Garou family?” There was a hitch of excitement in his tone, but Derek did not seem to be buying into it. Derek, if it was possible, had tensed further and increased his general sense of grumpiness. His eyebrows seemed to be semaphoring his disquiet to the rest of the pack as well – the atmosphere in the loft had changed.

“The Garou pack have written to you? Why? What do they want?” There was a sense of urgency in Derek’s tone that managed to pull Scott from gazing at Allison.

“It is just an invitation to spend the weekend with them, to improve relations between the packs. They are the closest pack to my territory”. There was a slight emphasis on the “my”. Scott was not as territorial as many alphas would be, but there was some pride in his ownership of half of Beacon Hills. 

“What do they say? Exactly?”

Stiles looked up, sensing the mood. It would have been hard to miss it, to be honest, but Stiles seemed to realise that this was more than a normal Derek strop. “Hold on…” Stiles hitched his glasses up, then took them off – Derek face betrayed his quick spike of vindication in this confirmation that they were just a prop.

Stiles cleared his throat and shook out the letter before reading. “Dear Scott, My husband and I would be delighted if you could come and stay for a weekend with us. With our pack territories so close, there are some things I would like to discuss on an alpha to alpha basis. It would just be a family gathering, but don’t worry – our daughter Shira is around your age, and just back from college, so you will not be left making polite conversation with the old folks all weekend. I am sure you two will get along famously. If you are free the first weekend in August, that would suit us very well, but if you have commitments I am sure we can find another time to all get together. With best wishes, Adeline Garou.”

There was a brief moment of silence, before Scott spoke. “I thought it was really nice of her. I mean she has emailed a couple of times, just some friendly warnings about omegas passing through in my direction and such like. It is nice that she is being neighbourly like this.”

“Oh my God this is a disaster”. Derek was almost growling. “A complete, fucking disaster. Don’t you see what this is, Scott? This is a formal invitation, for fuck’s sake.”

Scott looked taken aback at the vehemence of Derek’s language. “What, you mean I have to wear a suit? I can do that. I have a suit, and a tie and everything.” 

Allison leaned in and whispered in his ear. Every werewolf in the room grimaced, with varying degrees of theatricality, as they heard “you look almost as hot in a suit as in your birthday suit”. Derek’s grimace was brief.

“No, no, no”. He passed a hand over his face. “It is not that sort of formal, though yes you will need to take a suit. “

“And Allison would need a pretty dress, right? That cream strapless one, Allison, it really shows off your skin tone.” Scott had a soppy expression on his face.

“Taking Allison would be a big, big mistake”. Derek was emphatic.

“Ummm, Scott?” Allison sounded apprehensive. “My family has, ummm, some history with the Garou pack. I doubt I would be welcome.”

“History, meaning?” Peter piped up from the end of the table.

“History meaning what history in my family normally means” Allison snapped back. She tolerated Peter, but her conversations with him always gave the impression that she was seconds away from reaching for a crossbow.

“Ah.” Peter subsided into a smug silence.

“Well, if I can’t take Allison with me I am not going.” Scott was pouting and looking particularly mulish. In fact, he was pouting far more than normal. Stiles looked at him a little curiously, and Allison gave Scott a firm squeeze. Scott’s pout lessened somewhat. “Allison and I are together and her family are not her and I love her and…”

“And you have been invited to mate with the Garou girl, so dragging your hunter girlfriend along is bound to end well for all concerned”. Peter’s silence had not lasted long.

“No, wait, what? That is what that means? How can you tell that? They barely mention their daughter in the letter.” Stiles was all agitation, forgetting even to bang his gavel for order in his excitement.

“That is exactly what a hand written letter from one alpha to another is suggesting. With neighbouring territories? It is perfectly clear to anyone who is not brain damaged.” Derek was sounding increasingly agitated.

“Maybe if a certain leather clad freak of an alpha stopped bashing my head into inanimate objects I would be able to see more clearly. Some of us did not grow up surrounded by years of werewolf ritual you know.”

“Regardless” Derek sighed and turned to Scott. “You can’t take Allison. You need to find a way of backing out of this very carefully. You must not antagonise the Garou pack. That would not end well.” There was a pause. “Or, you know, you could marry the girl.”

“What?” There was a snarl of rage and Scott was on his feet, eyes flashing red and canines visibly lengthening. Stiles let off a volley of raps on the table with his gavel.

“Alpha McCall will sit down. Down boy. Sit. Scott, that was not serious. Alpha Hale will apologise if he does not want to get my gavel rapped over his knuckles.”

Derek grunted dismissively at Stiles, but then turned to Scott, who was still breathing heavily “I did not mean that Scott. But you need to understand how serious this situation is.”

“I just won’t go.”

“You have to go. This is a formal invitation from a neighbouring alpha. Their pack would take dismissal as a declaration of hostility. You think you, or even both of us, could defend Beacon Hills from a pack as old and established as the Garou? I am telling you we can’t.”

“But I can’t go without Allison. And I can’t pretend to be in love with someone else. What the hell am I going to do?” Scott’s pout was back. Allison was stroking his arm soothingly.

“Is it a problem if Scott is already attached to someone, or is it just a problem that he is attached to Allison?” Lydia looked up from her minute examination of her nail polish. “Because there is only a problem if it is a generic relationship that they would get antsy about, otherwise it is fine, obviously.”

Derek looked down at her, attempting a moment of ferocity in his glare before giving up any pretence of being able to intimidate Lydia. “It is Allison that is the problem. If Scott was in a relationship with someone else, they would be accepting of that. It would help if it was a pack relationship, of course, but werewolves do not force political matings where there is love already.”

“Well then, problem solved.”

Allison seemed to tense a little at that. Scott was too busy perfecting his pout to pay much attention. Derek looked at Lydia again. 

“You are volunteering? Because that isn’t going to work.”

“Of course I am not volunteering. Don’t be absurd Derek.” Lydia tossed her hair with a dismissive gesture. “Stiles will go as Scott’s mate.”

“Of course.” Relief was evident in Allison’s tone. “Stiles”.

Scott relaxed, the pout receding and a grin breaking out on his face. “Of course, that’s it. So dude, you up for it?”

“Of course, bro”

“NO.” The shout from Derek seemed to have been a bit louder than he intended and he looked somewhat embarrassed. “No, you can’t send Stiles in. It must be a werewolf. Stiles is human. If they find out he will have no chance of surviving.”

“If they find out none of you will have a chance of surviving” Stiles was adept at pointing out the bright side of things.

“Let Boyd do it.”

Boyd looked up from his Samsung tablet, where he had been taking minutes. “It wouldn’t work.” He saw the malevolent look from Derek. “Sorry. But it won’t. I love you Scott.” The last phrase was uttered entirely deadpan, but every werewolf in the room could hear the stutter of his heart and tell the lie.

“You could control the lie” Derek muttered aggressively. 

“As a one off? Sure. For a weekend? In a house full of werewolves? No chance.” Boyd bent his head back over his tablet. 

“Whereas Scott knows I love him. It is what makes me an awesome BFF” Stiles said happily.

“And I love you too, dude.” 

There was no heart stutter from either of them. Derek looked mutinous. “I still say no. It is too dangerous. You can’t risk it.”

“Derek!” There was aspersion in Scott’s tone. “Stiles is my pack, and it is me that the Garou pack wants to meet. Stiles can make up his own mind. He knows I will do whatever he tells me to do anyway.”

Derek looked like he knew he was losing the argument. It was not a good look on Derek.

“And really” Allison was being conciliatory “what choices do we have? Scott has to go, you said so yourself. He can’t go with me if they will react badly to a hunter, far less an Argent hunter. And he can’t be set up with the Garou girl because we all know that is not going to happen. It has to be someone who really loves Scott. Stiles is the only option.”

“Damn tooting”. Stiles stood and went over to his alpha, high fiving him. As their palms connected, Stiles interlinked his fingers into Scott’s, pulling their joined arms across Scott’s body as he stood behind, in a loose and affectionate hug.

Boyd looked up from his Samsung tablet. “Why are we still arguing this? I have put it in the minutes. ‘…it was obvious to the council that Stiles should pretend to be Scott’s mate, in order to avoid unpleasantness with the Garou pack.’” There was a sense of finality in Boyd’s tone. Clearly if it was in the minutes it was going to happen. “I did put a question mark in brackets after the ‘pretend’ though.”

Danny snorted with laughter from the end of the table. Allison smiled sweetly at Scott and Stiles.

“This will work”, her smile broadened a little “Just keep your hands to yourself in private”. 

“Allison!” Shock resonated in every syllable of Stiles’s protest. “Scott is my best bro. I would never, ever dream of…”

“I wasn’t talking to you, Stiles” Allison said.

Stiles started howling with laughter at the complete incomprehension on Scott’s face, doubling over as he could see the realisation dawn and gave way to a mingled expression of shock and hurt.

“Allison. How could you ever think there would be anyone but you… you know that you are all there has ever… I mean how could you even….”

His protestations were quickly cut off as Allison leant in to kiss him.

“Hey, you are supposed to share now” Stiles said.

Derek growled at the three of them from the other side of the table.


	2. Off to Mantua

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There was a sharp snap as Lydia closed her compact mirror. “I am no one’s beta, Derek.” There was a steely undertone to her voice. “I am associated with Scott’s pack because the society there is less mixed than in certain other packs I could name, and because I can see it is to my advantage to have werewolves on my side. Just in case good old uncle Fester over there gets any ideas.”
> 
> “I resent that” Peter called out.
> 
> “Whatever.” Derek was not keen to continue this particular debate. “The point is, Scott, you can’t spend any more time with Allison this week.”

Two weeks after the arrival of the letter, the two Beacon Hills packs gathered again in Derek’s loft. The fortnightly ritual had been established for over a year – Thursday nights, to allow the couples to date on Fridays, and the singles to haunt their pick-up joint of choice. There was some speculation as to what Derek did on Fridays. Stiles was convinced he stayed at home in front of a mirror, trying out which eyebrow movements went best with which leather jacket. Danny swore one of the drag queens at Jungle had Derek’s swagger as she strutted across the stage. Scott, ever the romantic, held that he waited beneath the window of his one true love, whimpering to be let in and scratching at the glass. The possibilities were endless, but no one was going to broach the subject with the object of the speculation in order to get the truth; no one had a death wish. At some point there was going to have to be a full investigation; there was a sweepstake on the outcome, and the pot was already over $500.

There was just over a week to go before the first weekend of August, the agreed date on the invitation Scott had received from the Garou pack, but neither Scott nor Stiles had given the thing much thought. Scott had written a reply – Derek had been insistent that it had to be a formal letter – accepting the invitation and asking casually if he could bring his mate Stiles along as well. The reply to that from Adeline Garou had been perfectly polite, but definitely less affable in tone than her original letter. Stiles chalked that up as an important step forward. 

The packs seemed to be mingling a little better than usual, though the conversation was still subdued. Derek sat at the table in front of the window, seemingly attempting to block the late evening sunshine from the room by singlehandedly projecting a malevolent cloud of doom into the atmosphere. Stiles was oblivious as he moved round the living space with a tray of drinks, before making his way to the top of the table. The normal barrage of raps with the gavel startled Derek out of his introspective moping.

“I call the Beacon Hills Inter-Pack Council to order”. Stiles fumbled for his glasses, and put them on slightly askew. “Danny, Isaac, we all know what you are doing over there. It is not big and it is not clever. Come and join the grown-ups at the table.” Danny and Isaac moved to join the others – Isaac flushing a little, but Danny completely unconcerned – in spite of the red mark that was just starting to blush out from the edge of his T-shirt collar.

“So, item one – approval of the minutes.” 

The normal murmur of agreement was disturbed by a growl of dissent from Derek. “You forgot to add the complete insanity of this plan, and the reckless stupidity of putting a human in danger.”

“You were out voted. Shut up.” Stiles waved his gavel in a dismissive manner. Derek looked like he was going to snatch it out of the air.

“Item two. Alpha Hale has something he would like to share with the group. Come on Derek, unburden your soul. Tell us your innermost secrets. Is it boxers or briefs?”

Danny whispered audibly to Isaac “Commando”, causing Derek to turn a death glare in their direction.

“So, if you are planning to go ahead with this completely insane plan, I am going to have to come along. That way when it blows up in your faces there might be some chance that one of you makes it out alive. Badly maimed, of course – but alive.”

Scott snorted derisively. Stiles gave a couple of thoughtful bangs with his gavel, and looked at Derek speculatively while chiding Scott. “No snorting, alpha McCall. If you have something to say then say it.”

“How exactly are we going to get you along, Derek? Are you planning on curling up in the woods, ready to come running at the first sign of trouble? The invite was to me, and I asked if I could bring my mate along. I can’t see how I am going to get your paws in the door.”

“Adeline already invited me”. Derek was giving off an aura of grim smugness now. “She was a very close friend of my mother, was maid of honour at my parents’ wedding….” Derek tailed off for a moment. “So when I mentioned that it was ages since we had caught up, and that I would be coming back from LA the first week in August, she invited me to spend the weekend.”

Scott had been looking resistant, until Derek had mentioned his parents. His face had taken on a soppy expression that blended pity and sympathy, and he half reached out a hand in Derek’s direction before thinking better of it.

“If it works for Stiles, it works for me.”

“The more the merrier”. Stiles was sounding cheerful. “It'll be fun. We can tease Derek over dinner. Maybe Adeline has some baby photos of him tucked away somewhere.”

Derek growled, but Stiles just ignored him. Derek continued in an emphatic voice; “You are going to be too busy concentrating on making this complete charade work properly” – Derek was looking pointedly between Stiles and Scott. “You” he gestured at Scott “you reek of Allison. Stiles’s scent is there, but it's not exactly at the top”.

Scott looked startled. “We’ve been hanging out.”

“That won’t do. Don’t you realise? You have to treat Stiles the way you would treat Allison. Be with him as much as you would Allison. And be with Allison as much as you would any other beta in your pack – as much as you would Lydia, say.”

There was a sharp snap as Lydia closed her compact mirror. “I am no one’s beta, Derek.” There was a steely undertone to her voice. “I am associated with Scott’s pack because the society there is less mixed than in certain other packs I could name, and because I can see it is to my advantage to have werewolves on my side. Just in case good old uncle Fester over there gets any ideas.”

“I resent that” Peter called out.

“Whatever.” Derek was not keen to continue this particular debate. “The point is, Scott, you can’t spend any more time with Allison this week.”

Scott’s face drained of colour. “What? No. That’s not right. I mean we could use perfume, or aftershave, or ammonia to disguise…”

Allison was stroking his arm. “Scott, Derek’s right. It is just a week. And we can Skype, and text. And see each other in a pack-like way. Just for a week.”

“Allison….” Scott was wailing. Derek looked triumphantly at him across the table.”

“Still want to take Stiles as your mate?”

Scott seemed to pull himself together at the mention of Stiles’s name. “Yes, of course. We have to go through with it. I just need to remember why I'm doing this.”

“Love” Allison murmured.

“Love” Scott agreed, nuzzling into her neck.

“Ahem” Stiles cleared his throat. “Do you have to cheat on me right before my eyes, Scott? Come nuzzle my neck”.

Scott glowered briefly at him, and then moved to rest his forehead against Allison’s. “This is going to be so hard…”

“The greater good.” Allison was firm.

“That is not all.” Derek was relentless. “You two are going to have to share each other’s clothes.”

“Dude, get real. We do that all the time.” Stiles paused. “Incidentally, Scotty boy. You need to stop borrowing the tighter fitting T shirts. My stud muffin blue is all stretched out of shape.”

Scott lifted his head from Allison to smile a little wanly across at Stiles. “I can’t help it if my fine, manly physique and the associated werewolf muscles gives me firm pecs”.

“It wasn’t the chest I was talking about, it was the stomach.”

“What, no way. You take that back.” Scott was lifting up his shirt, or possibly Stiles’s shirt, to demonstrate the honed muscles of his abs.

“AND” Derek continued with a stridently insistent tone “you will have to sleep together.”

“Yeah, ‘cos that’s never happened before”. Scott waved a hand in Derek’s general direction, dismissively. Derek seemed to be breathing more heavily at that.

“We haven’t in a while” Stiles admitted. “Not since at least…. Last Thursday, when I crashed out after we played pool. It's been a week.”

“After you passed out after three beers, you mean….” Scott was grinning a little more cheerfully now, though still holding Allison close. “Well, I have a week of you flailing around in bed next to me, it seems”. Scott grinned. Derek’s breathing was becoming more laboured.

“Well, fascinating though the intimate details of your epic bromance are” Lydia had finished touching up her make-up “I have things to do, places to be”

“Jocks to do, just two or three” Scott and Stiles chorused, earning a dismissive hair flip from Lydia and a slap directed at Scott from Allison in defence of her friend.

“If there's nothing else?” Stiles looked around the table “Then same time in two weeks, assuming we all make it out of Garou territory alive. I declare this council meeting closed.” There was a rap of the gavel, followed by Stiles snatching it out of Derek’s reach. The group slowly broke up, moving off towards the door. Derek disappeared off carrying a handful of dirty drinks glasses.

Allison and Scott were embarked on an intensive and drawn out farewell in the living area.

“You know we have to… there was no other possible way we could make this work.” Allison, as ever, was behaving with control and rationality. Scott was wiping his eyes in a rather suspicious manner. “We thought and thought, and this is the only way we could solve this situation.”

Stiles looked at the pair of them quizzically. There had not, after all, been much debate about the “Stiles as fake boyfriend of Scott” scenario.

“I'm doing it for love” Scott muttered.

“Exactly. And it is not for ever. Ten days and it will all be over one way or another”.

Something in Scott and Allison’s conversation seemed to be niggling away at Stiles. It seemed a rather callous way of considering the peril they would be in if this went badly. 

“So, off you go to Mantua, my Romeo”.

“Parting is such sweet sorrow.”

“Hold on” Stiles interjected. “Let’s not get carried away with this. Because I'm pretty sure that if Scott here is Romeo then I'm Mercutio, which means that Tybalt –who I'm guessing is Derek – kills me to death by poking me with his sword, somewhere around Act three, which I am guessing is the Garou weekend house party. And I don’t want Derek killing me to death.”

Scott snorted with laughter. “Not even if he is poking you with his sword?”

“Shut up”. Stiles flushed a deep red, and there was an audible alpha growl from the kitchen area.

Danny and Isaac wandered past, exchanging laconic waves and backslaps with the others. The hickey on Danny’s neck seemed to be troubling him a little. He was rubbing at it, pushing the neck of his T shirt as he did, which only served to draw attention to the mark.

As the door closed behind them Scott drew in a deep breath, and looked carefully at Allison before turning to Stiles.

“So, if this is going to work, I think we might have to take things a little further.”

Stiles looked up from packing the gavel (carefully placed in its box) into his Batman backpack.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I think I might have to mark you a little. You know. On your neck or something.”

“What do you… oh… yeah. Right. Well, it’s not like we haven’t done it before.”

“Dude, bro code!”

“Come on. I bet Allison knows already”. 

Scott had the good grace to look somewhat embarrassed. 

“Just as I thought” Stiles was triumphant. “Though youthful experimentation at the age of nine may be a little different from what we have to do now. So, how do you want me? Shirtless? Swooning in your arms? Crushed up against the wall while you loom over me with a menacing glower?”

“Just… just stay where you are, OK?” Scott moved awkwardly towards Stiles. Allison was valiantly trying, but failing, to keep a straight face in the background. Scott leaned in and put his arms around Stiles, something that was perfectly natural to them. He leant in to rest his head on Stiles’s shoulder – nothing out of the ordinary there. It was as he began to chase kisses along Stiles’s neck that things went awry. Stiles squirmed and giggled. 

“Dude, what are you doing?”

Scott lifted his head. “Umm, preparing to mark you?”

“You don’t have to kiss me first, Scotty. I'm an easy first date. Ask anyone.”

“I can’t do this unless I do it properly. It doesn’t feel right.” Scott had his mulish expression on again. 

Stiles looked over to Allison. “Is he this formulaic with you?”

Allison just shrugged. “I’d go with it Stiles. He is a fantastic kisser. You're in for the weekend of a lifetime.”

Stiles stuck his tongue out at her. “Stop sticking up for your sappy boyfriend.”

Scott took a deep breath and started again on Stiles’s neck. Stiles relaxed a little, though gave a small jump as Scott began to actually suck down. That was nothing to the start he gave when there was a sharp alpha roar behind him.

“What the fuck is going here?”

Derek was back.


	3. Background research

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles glared. It had no effect, as Scott had his eyes on the road and was hunched over the steering wheel in what Stiles called his “Driving Miss Daisy” pose, but the glare was still there. “Supernatural. You are not sneaking in a Buffy episode in this evening. I am not having you whimpering in sympathy with Oz for an hour. Supernatural is about brotherhood and the honest evolution of male on male love. And about the possibilities surrounding Jensen Ackles’s body, but I guess that is more for me than for you.”

Unusually it was Scott who raised the idea of background research. Stiles was lying on Scott’s bed (technically, if temporarily, their bed) early on Saturday evening, surrounded by the chaos of packing. Scott and Allison had finally bought a place together and were taking possession the week after the Garou weekend. Stiles was supposed to be helping with the move. What Stiles was actually doing was sprawling on top of the duvet and engaging in a staring contest with Scott’s teddy bear Aloysius. As the staring contest required supreme concentration, he had not paid much attention to what Scott had said when he came back into the room.

“I don’t think Aloysius likes me…. Wait. What did you just say?”

“I said I think we should go over to Derek’s.”

“Did he text you? Is something up?”

Scott had been putting away his phone as he had come into the bedroom, and he gave a slightly guilty start at Stiles’s words and seemed to consider his reply with undue care. 

“Ummm, no, Derek hasn’t texted me. I was just sending a message to Allison. But I was thinking that we ought to try and get some more info on the Garou pack. You heard Derek - his family seemed to know them pretty well. It might help us know how we should behave, you know?”

Stiles pondered for a moment. “Sure. But when we get back we are going to have a ‘Supernatural’ marathon, whether you want it or not. We can learn far more about going from bromance to romance by immersing ourselves in some Destiel luvvin’.” Scott looked slightly bemused at the reference. “God, you are so unprepared for this, Scott”. Stiles swooped in on him, hugging him close with one arm, while trying to manoeuvre in what he clearly thought was a stealthy manner to grab Scott’s car keys. “I’ll drive, shall I?”

Scott snatched the keys away from his reach. “The hell you will. You are going nowhere near our car.”

“You see” Stiles crowed triumphantly. “You said our car. So I should get to drive. Sharing is the basis of any good couple’s relationship.”

“Mine and Allison’s car. And it’s new. Well, new to us.”

“Who is this Allison of whom you speak?” Stiles was grinning. Scott pulled him into a headlock and dragged him to the door.

 

 

“Dude, you do realise my dad is the Sheriff, right? And I already used all my ‘get Scott out of jail free’ cards for this month. You don’t have to prove that your Toyota Prius can go faster than my Jeep. You can go faster on your push bike than my Jeep.” 

Scott had seemed in a hurry to get to Derek’s loft, dragging Stiles to the very door of his car before releasing him from the headlock (normally he let go at the front door), and then setting off at speed before Stiles had finished buckling his seat belt. Admittedly Stiles buckling his seatbelt normally took some time to coordinate.

“I am just keen to get back for your Buffy marathon.”

Stiles glared. It had no effect, as Scott had his eyes on the road and was hunched over the steering wheel in what Stiles called his “Driving Miss Daisy” pose, but the glare was still there. “Supernatural. You are not sneaking in a Buffy episode in this evening. I am not having you whimpering in sympathy with Oz for an hour. Supernatural is about brotherhood and the honest evolution of male on male love. And about the possibilities surrounding Jensen Ackles’s body, but I guess that is more for me than for you.”

“Whatever, dude. Just bear in mind what a toned package you are getting with your fake boyfriend. I am way fitter than that Dean bloke” Scott had been harping on about this ever since Stiles’s stretched T shirt jibe. He pulled the car to a halt outside Derek’s loft building.

“Yeah, yeah, I am privileged to be able to lick my way up the toned expanse of your salty abs. Even if it is only a fake, entirely abstract licking. Get over it Scott…” 

Stiles looked up from his fiddling with the radio. He never allowed a song to conclude, constantly searching for the elusive perfect station that could never exist, at least not to Stiles’s musical standards. “Wait, we’re here already? No way, dude. Every light must have been green.” Scott seemed to tense slightly, as Stiles continued “That never happens… well only when I am in the patrol car with my dad and the station control the traffic lights to speed up the journey.” There was a reflective tone in Stiles’s voice. This sort of oddity got him thinking. “Perhaps something is going on, and the station has set the lights to green because they need to get patrol cars here fast. We should have called Derek, maybe something is happening. Is he OK, do you think? Derek, I mean. He would have howled or something if there was a problem, right? Your wolfy senses would tell us if something were wrong, yes?”

“Dude”. Scott tried to appear relaxed, with something of an effort, and his face now wore the slightly exasperated ‘have you taken your Adderall today?’ look Stile was familiar with.

“What? Like it’s never happened before?”

“Well, yeah, but not for like months. And there is no trouble that I can smell. Just Derek. And Isaac. That’s it.”

Stiles still twitched edgily until they made it to Derek’s doorway. Scott’s finger had barely left the bell when Isaac opened the door, sweaty and clad in running shorts. 

“Guys, what are you doing here?” Isaac was sounding a little stilted. Scott frowned slightly at him. “Come on in. We just got back from a run.”

There was a growl from the main living area. “We just got back from you pretending to run, and spending half your time texting on that damn Samsung of yours. Honestly can’t you spend five minutes without texting Danny?”

“Derek…” Isaac’s voice had a whining undertone. “It was one text. And you know Danny gets nervous easily after the whole Ethan thing.” The three of them came out of the entrance area to find Derek stretching on a yoga mat in the middle of the loft, clad only in Lycra shorts.

Tight, form fitting, sweat glistening Lycra shorts.

There was a pause, while Derek contorted himself into a new stretch. 

“Stiles. Scott. What do you want?”

Isaac cleared his throat. “Ummm. I’m going to grab a shower and head out. Danny and I are off to Jungle tonight, and then…” there was a pause. “I’ll see you tomorrow Derek?” There was a hint of a question in Isaac’s tone, asking permission from his alpha. Derek grunted.

“Great. See you guys.” Isaac moved towards the staircase, but as he did so he clapped his hand against the left side of his neck. The motion made a sound. Isaac seemed to glance significantly towards Scott. Scott, furtively, returned the significant glance. It seemed to be a big evening for significant glances. Stiles was giving a pretty significant glance at Derek as he contorted his body into stretches, and so missed the Scott-Isaac-significant-glance exchange – although in Stiles’s case perhaps ‘open mouthed mesmerisation’ was more apt than ‘glance’. Isaac gave a half nod to the three of them in general, accompanied by a little exhale of breath. “Have fun”. 

A minute later the sound of Isaac’s shower could be heard running in the background.

Derek corkscrewed himself into another stretch, while simultaneously managing to contort his eyebrows into a solid line of dark, hairy displeasure. “What do you want?” he repeated.

Stiles hitched up his jaw, seemingly with some effort. “No need to be such an aggressive Sourwolf about things. We are on a quest for information”. With that he threw himself onto Derek’s couch, putting his feet up onto the glass and chrome coffee table before him, only to have the table twitched away with a barely discernible movement from Derek. Stiles’s feet fell to the floor with a thud.

Scott sat down next to Stiles, throwing his right arm around Stiles’s neck and pulling him into a sideways hug, in an unconsciously intimate gesture. Derek’s eyes seemed to flick back and forth between them at the movement, before he drew in a breath and stretched his torso forward while staring intently at the mat beneath him as he did so. Stiles rested his head on Scott’s shoulder for a moment as he contemplated Derek’s contortions.

“So…” Scott began slowly, seemingly choosing his words with deliberation. “The Garou family. I mean, you obviously know them, right? And you must know about werewolf etiquette, being raised by wolves and all. So we were wondering; what should we do? I mean, I am sure Adeline will cut me some slack as a bitten wolf, but it would be better to impress her with good wolfy manners.”

Derek pushed himself up into a seated position, and turned to the two younger men, treating them to a particularly sullen expression. “It’s not that different from basic human etiquette, though you might want to not refer to… Adeline” Derek had stuttered a bit before saying the name “by her first name. You should call her Alpha Garou, at least until she asks you to call her Adeline.”

“Does that go for me too?” Stiles was shifting restlessly against Scott’s shoulder with a gentle undercurrent of nervous energy – looking at Derek, and then looking away again quickly before sliding his gaze back.

“You?” Derek seemed to tense. “Of course you refer to her as Alpha Garou. Even if she asks Scott to call her Adeline – incidentally she will call you Alpha McCall, but you need to address her as Alpha Garou first.”

Stiles lifted his head from Scott’s shoulder to nod his comprehension “to show deference to the established nature of her pack, right?”.

“And you” Derek seemed to swallow before continuing with his instructions to Stiles. “You will have to… well, you are going to have to bare your neck to … Adeline, after Scott introduces you.”

“Bare my neck? What, in case she feels like chomping down?”

“I doubt she will find any unmarked skin.” Derek stared with something like distaste at the single if somewhat large red blotch that had resulted from Scott’s rather enthusiastic marking technique. “But that is the theory, yes. Scott will introduce you, as his mate, and then…” Derek paused. “You will have to do that without lying Scott. Crap. This isn’t going to work.”

“Sure it will”. Scott stood up entirely at ease. “Come on, you be Adeline.”

Derek glowered.

“Come on Derek, upsidaisy.” 

Derek huffed out a sigh, but stood. Stiles seemed to be staring straight ahead from where he still sat on the couch, his eye line just about at the level of Derek’s waistband, where it gripped Derek’s muscled stomach.

Scott bowed his head briefly but deferentially to Derek. “Alpha Garou, so pleased to meet you.”

Derek huffed again, but growled out “Alpha McCall. So glad you could come.”

“And if I may, I would like to present my mate for life, Stiles Stilinski”

Derek looked utterly shocked. “I heard nothing. No stutter. Nothing. How did you control it that well?”

Scott smiled smugly, and turned to high five Stiles behind him – Stiles tore his gaze away from whatever it was he had been focusing on and grinned up at him. “Gotta love Harry Potter.”

“Sure thing dude.”

Derek looked bemused. Stiles hauled himself to his feet. “Scott isn’t lying. I am his mate for life, and his is mine”. Derek’s forehead creased, though whether through incomprehension, rage, or some reflex reaction related to the fact that he had not frowned for several minutes and his body could not cope with the withdrawal, was not clear.

Scott was watching Derek a little apprehensively. “Mate like the British use the word ‘mate’. Meaning friend. It was Isaac’s suggestion – he really digs British TV shows for some reason. We are like Ron and Harry.”

“I’m Harry” Stiles interjected hastily. “What?” He looked at Scott. “I am so totally Harry. Magic and everything.”

“You’re not magic” Derek and Scott chorused together. 

“Using magic when you have been given it does not make you magic”- Derek’s voice was tired. It was an argument that had often been made. Derek’s forehead was no longer creased however, for whatever reason. He paused for a moment. “So you come forward, and bare your neck.”

“Like this? Alpha Garou…” Stiles moved closer to Derek, and pulled the neckline of his T shirt to one side while craning his neck away on the other.

“God! NO! I mean, Christ, Stiles, what are you doing. Are you trying to get her to mate with you or something? I mean, NO, just NO!” Derek took several steps back, breathing through his mouth rather than his nose.

Stiles looked rather taken aback at the vehemence of Derek’s reaction, but tried again without the T shirt pulling. “Like that?”

“Yes.” Derek was breathing fast. “Yes, that will do. And then it would probably help to go back deferentially to Scott and… “Derek paused again, seemingly struggling with something “and make some kind of demonstration of affection.”

“Sure thing”. Stiles turned and leapt at Scott, Scott caught him with a surprised exhaled “ooof” of breath as he cradled Stiles in his arms. Stiles planted a kiss on Scott’s cheek.

“STILES.” Derek seemed to be losing what self-control he had had. 

“Too much?”

“You look like a cartoon. Shaggy leaping into the arms of Scooby Doo. For fuck’s sake Stiles, take this SERIOUSLY. Dial it back.”

“Dude, did you just make a pop culture reference? You totally did, didn’t you? You made a pop culture reference. That is awesome. You see how you are blending in with normal people? I am so proud of you right now…” Stiles was beaming. Derek’s grimace of displeasure seemed to fade somewhat against the onslaught of praise.

“Dial. It. Back.” 

“Sure, sure. I am just messing with you. Less Scooby Doo.” Stiles dragged Scott back onto the couch. Derek loomed over the two of them, looking a little uncertain what to do, and somewhat self-conscious.

“So what else should we…” Stiles broke off with what could only be considered a giggle, shrugging his left shoulder against Scott’s sudden encroachment. “Scott, what the hell dude?”

“I thought we should practice the whole… ummm… marking thing in front of other people. It needs to seem natural. And I know that it has worked fine when we’ve practiced at home but that is in the privacy of my bedroom, not in public.”

Derek’s resemblance to a Greek statue of Adonis was heightened by his complete immobility and tensed muscles while this was going on.

“Yeah. OK, but not right now, bro? One thing at a time. So, Derek, what else?”

“That is about it, I think. Although Scott, you will need to keep your physical interaction with Allison to a minimum this week. Even pack events.”

“Awwww, dude, that means you will have to skip your salsa dance class on Wednesday. I’m sorry for you bro.” Stiles punched Scott lightly on the arm while wearing an expression of complete insincerity.

Derek’s mouth twitched, almost in spite of himself. It was almost as if he were going to smile, before remembering that he taken some kind of weird vow never to do that.

“Scott… does salsa?”

“Every Wednesday for, like, over two months. With Allison, of course. They won’t take me along. I haven’t seen him this committed to something since he was eight and he set about collecting….”

“DUDE! Bro code, bro code.” Scott was frantically trying to get a hand over Stiles’s mouth, while Stiles wriggled around on Derek’s couch to evade him.

“Ok, ok. The secret is safe with me Scott. But it was nothing to be ashamed of.”

“Dude, please.”

Derek cleared his throat with an undercurrent of a growl to it. “And you will also need to find some reason why you won’t be sleeping together.”

Scott looked blankly at him. “But we will be sleeping together.”

“Yeah, Derek, why did you think we won’t be sleeping together?”

Derek tensed. “I meant having sex together. I assume you are not going to be doing that?”

Scott looked shocked. “Should we? I mean, I assumed we wouldn’t be, but.. well… if it were important, a matter of life or death….” He tailed off. The tendons in Derek’s arms looked like they might snap under the strain of his clenching.

“That’s so sweet” Stiles was entirely relaxed about the proposal. “But all I need do, when we are alone in the privacy of our bedchamber” Stiles leered at Scott “is just say something about how you won’t be getting to tap this particularly fine piece of ass in a house full of werewolf hearing enabled werewolves, because I am not into providing said werewolves with some kind of audio werewolf porn experience. Which has the added and completely surprising benefit of actually being true.”

“So we’re good”? Scott looked to Derek for confirmation. “We have the basics covered. But it might be worth us coming back later this week just to recap on a few things.”

“Wednesday night would be free…” Stiles muttered under his breath, not that muttering made much of a difference when the other occupants of the loft were werewolves. Derek nodded tersely to Scott’s suggestion.

“Fantastic.” Scott suddenly leant into Stiles, and started nibbling at the left side of his neck once more. “Just the PDA to perfect”.

Scott looked up after a moment to see Derek turning swiftly and walking towards the staircase, the shoulders of his back tensed into a V shape that seemed to exude disapproval. Stiles’s heart beat had picked up somewhat – and Scott did not need to be a werewolf to notice.


	4. You deserve to be happy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adeline left Stiles and swept over to Derek where he stood by his car. She pulled him into a hug, kissed his cheek, and then cuffed him gently around the side of the head. “That is for being so formal. Alpha Garou indeed. It is Auntie Adeline as well you know.” She cuffed him again. “And that is for leaving it so long before visiting.” Adeline pinched Derek’s cheek. “Email is not a proper way to keep in touch. I missed my little Delly-belly.”

Scott carefully pulled his Toyota off the road into the small car park of a nature reserve located a couple of miles from the edge of the Garou pack’s territory. Ahead there was the gleaming burgundy of Derek’s Mark II Jaguar, with Derek pacing restlessly in front. When the Camaro had met its unfortunate end, regretted by all, Derek’s choice of a classic car had surprised everyone. It had seemed utterly out of character – and burgundy rather than black even more so. Stiles had been ecstatic, though. He had seen an identical car on one of the British detective TV shows that Isaac was addicted to (identical aside from the steering wheel position, of course), and had instantly proclaimed it was the most beautiful car he had ever seen – not excepting even his Jeep. He had never thought to know someone who owned one, however, and now that he did he never missed an opportunity to sit in it. Scott knew it was Stiles’s ambition to be allowed to drive the Jaguar. Scott was pretty sure Derek barely accepted letting him ride in it, and then only under careful supervision.

They got out, and Stiles went over to pat the radiator of the car. Derek had resigned himself to this, after months of telling Stiles he would break his fingers if he got sticky fingerprints on the chrome. Derek’s general outlook, however, seemed to be even more disapproving than normal.

“This won’t work”

“Oh, stop being such a grumpy paws”. Stiles was dismissive, as he stroked the jaguar mascot with his forefinger. “It is too late to back out now”.

Derek made a derisive “Hah” sound. 

“So, we’ll set off now, and you follow ten minutes behind. If anything is going wrong it should be evident within ten minutes. How’s the scent?” Stiles looked inquiringly at Derek.

“You reek of each other. Your scents are blended. Though they were always pretty similar.” The words sounded like they were being dragged out of Derek with pliers. His lack of enthusiasm seemed to be growing by the second.

“What about the car?”

Derek strode over to where the Toyota sat parked, and opened the door before recoiling as if he had been hit in the face.

“What the hell did you do in there? That scent is…” Derek’s seemed on the verge of wolfing out.

“Clever, no?” Scott seemed to snap out of the reverie of concentration he had been in for most of the journey. “Stiles left a pair of his boxers under the passenger seat. So if the Garou do check the car, not that I think they will, they will think…”

“They will think that Scott got very lucky indeed at some point.” Stiles finished triumphantly.

“It also helps mask any lingering traces of Allison’s scent.” Scott sounded rueful about this.

“Cheer up Scott. Only a couple of days – and then you are moving in together. You will be with her 24/7”.

Scott brightened at that. “OK then. We’ll head off and Derek follows ten minutes behind as we agreed. Are we ready? Shall we go?”

 

 

The Garou house was half an hour further on – a large classically designed building set at the end of a long gravel drive – impressive without being ostentatious. ‘Old money’ was how Derek had described the Garou pack. Someone, presumably Adeline, stood at the door waiting to welcome them. She was a slightly formidable looking woman in her sixties, exuding elegant poise but at the same time clearly not a person to mess with. Scott and Stiles got out of the car, and Scott took Stiles’s hand in his.

“Alpha Garou, so pleased to be able to see you in person.” Scott sounded slightly rehearsed, as he bent his head deferentially. 

“Alpha McCall”. Adeline inclined her head. “Don’t be so formal, there is no need to stand on ceremony. Call me Adeline.”

“Adeline.” Scott smiled his most winning, puppy-dog smile at her. “And can I present my mate, Stiles?”

Stiles stepped forward, a little apprehensively. “Alpha Garou, how nice to meet you”. He bent his head to the right, exposing his neck – with a couple of marks from Scott visible against the paleness of his skin.

“Well, aren’t you a delightfully polite young man.” Adeline sounded slightly amused. “You must call me Adeline too. I am sure we are going to get along famously…”

The sudden crunch of tires on gravel could be heard, and Derek pulled up behind Scott’s Prius. Stiles sighed. It had been far less than ten minutes since he and Scott had arrived. Derek was clearly panicking. Although to be fair Scott had driven pretty slowly up the drive (concerned that the gravel may leap off the road surface and attack the paintwork of the “new to us” Toyota).

“And here’s Derek” cried Adeline in a ringing voice as he got out the car.

“Alpha Garou”. Derek bowed deferentially, as Scott had done. 

“How was Los Angeles? Come here” Adeline left Stiles and swept over to Derek where he stood by his car. She pulled him into a hug, kissed his cheek, and then cuffed him gently around the side of the head. “That is for being so formal. Alpha Garou indeed. It is Auntie Adeline as well you know.” She cuffed him again. “And that is for leaving it so long before visiting.” Adeline pinched Derek’s cheek. “Email is not a proper way to keep in touch. I missed my little Delly-belly.”

Stiles manfully choked down a sob of laughter, although he looked like the effort to keep from doubling over might cost him a couple of dislocated ribs.

“Delly-belly?” Stiles asked, his voice a little strained.

“Oh, before he became such a high and mighty alpha, Derek here was the cutest little baby you ever saw. He had such chubby little legs, and blond hair, and an adorable lisp.”

“You must show us some photos” Stiles was enthusiastic. Derek looked like he wanted to growl.

“Oh, of course”. Adeline patted Derek’s face, which had flushed a brilliant red. “Mind you shave for dinner, Derek. You are not old enough to grow a beard, you know.” There was a sound behind them.

“My husband on the other hand, has a beard just to spite me…” Adeline sounded affectionate. “Albert this is Scott and Stiles – and look who turned up early? My little Delly-belly is here.” Scott and Stiles each shook hands with Adeline’s husband, a man about her age with a neat white beard. 

Derek was unable to get away from Adeline, so confined himself to a nod and an “Uncle Albert” by way of greeting.

“And here is Shira”. A young werewolf, in her early twenties, came over and almost threw herself at Derek. “Derek… how lovely to see you again”. She kissed him, lingering a little as she did so.

“Rodney is still at university” Adeline said to Derek. She turned to Scott and Stiles. “My son, Rodney. Doing a masters degree in geography on the East Coast.” She looked back at Derek “He just got engaged to a very nice girl called Cassandra, very nice family. Human, but they know about werewolves. Come on everyone, let’s get inside. Shira, why don’t you show Derek to his room?” Shira willingly linked her arm into Derek’s and dragged him towards the door. A small smear of her lipstick was visible on Derek’s cheek. Stiles watched them head off, with an unreadable expression on his face.

 

 

Late that night, after dinner, Scott and Stiles had been able to escape to their room. The day had been a success. There had been no slip ups, and only one potential mistake, which Scott had gracefully avoided. Adeline had not seemed to want to probe the nature of Scott and Stiles’s relationship too much. For the most part, they had just to demonstrate the physical signs of being a couple. Shira has been very attentive to Derek, and did not seem in the least concerned that Scott was already spoken for. Baby photos had been produced, and Derek had been mortified by Stiles’s cooing sounds as he and Adeline bent over the album. It was an old album, stopping when Derek was a podgy ten year old. Nothing later than that – Stiles had appreciated that the memories would become increasingly painful. 

Dinner had been formal - although Adeline had said it was “just casual, no need to dress. Lounge suits only, as we are all friends here.” Back in Beacon Hills Lydia had explained to Scott and Stiles that if they were required to dress for dinner it would have meant black tie. At Scott’s confusion she had elaborated “tuxedo”, and made some muttered reference to “dry run for the wedding” that had left Scott blushing deeply with confusion.

It may have been casual for Adeline, but just before they went down to dinner the dress code had almost triggered the potential mistake of the day. Stiles had been exiting the bedroom he was sharing with Scott at just the same moment that Derek was leaving his room next door. They had stopped and stared at each other, Derek with his hand on his door handle, as if preparing to bolt back into the room.

“You look… very… nice”. Stiles’s voice had a strangled quality to it as he stared at Derek’s dark charcoal suit, with a deep burgundy tie that seemed to be temporarily reflected in his eyes. Stiles blinked. There was no reason for Derek to have had a flash of alpha red.

“You look… pretty OK too.” Derek’s voice was gruff as he took in the form fitting nature of Stiles’s suit. Stiles’s heart rate started to pick up – he was aware of it and Derek must have been able to hear it. And if Derek could hear it, the other werewolves would be able to do so. At that moment Scott came out to join them. 

“Stiles, there is no need to be nervous. They all love you. As do I.” He had whispered it into Stiles’s ear, but with the knowledge that any werewolf that had heard Stiles’s heart could also hear his words. Stiles huffed in relief, and linked his arm with Scott, as they turned to go down to dinner.

Derek breathed out, and slowly released his grip on the door handle, before following. He did not notice the dent in the brass of the door handle – a dent that seemed to correspond to the position of his fingers moments earlier.

But now dinner was behind them, coffee and liqueurs had been served in the drawing room, and there just remained one last piece of theatre to go through.

From his room next to Scott and Stiles, Derek could hear everything. He felt no need to try and not listen, it was all planned and pre-scripted anyway. Right on cue, he heard Scott starting to kiss Stiles’s neck. Derek began pacing the room.

“I really like Adeline.” Stiles was saying, and there was no heart stutter. Stiles knew better than to lie.

“Uh huh”. Scott seemed to have temporarily interrupted his marking of Stiles. Next door, Derek clenched and opened his fists a couple of times.

“Scott, what are you doing?” There was the sound of fabric rustling as a shirt was removed. 

“It’s time for bed. You need to be undressed.” The clunk of a belt buckle being undone.

“Scott, no”. 

Derek tensed further, halting his pacing of the room. 

“What? Why not?”

“Because we are not making love in a house full of werewolves with werewolf hearing.”

That was the critical line, and Derek relaxed as Stiles delivered it. There was no trace of a lie – it was not a lie, of course, the words had been carefully selected – and now it was delivered Scott could stop marking Stiles and they could all get to sleep.

There was a sound of kissing from Scott and Stiles’s room. Derek tensed again. This was not part of the script. They were supposed to have finished by now. Derek unconsciously edged closer to the wall that divided the two guest rooms.

“Scott.” Stiles seemed to be trying to contain his laughter. “I said no.”

There was a further rustle of fabric, as if trousers were being pulled off. “Why are you wearing your black briefs then? You know they make you look extra sexy.”

Derek’s claws extended out and dug into his palms. This was not at all what had been agreed, this was nothing like what they had rehearsed last Wednesday, and yet Scott did not seem to be lying at all.

“Down boy. Or I will go and find a rolled up newspaper. You are not tapping this fine piece of ass tonight.”

“You spoil all the fun.”

There was a creak of the bedframe. 

“Come on Scott, hurry up. I want to get to sleep.”

Derek suddenly made a choked sound. A pungent scent had suddenly assailed his nostrils. Scott’s scent, but not his normal scent. It was the strong scent of Scott’s arousal.

 

 

Derek pushed out of his room, trying not to breathe through his nose, stumbling a little blindly down the stairs. His vision blurred a little, and he paused in the entrance hall to rub at his eyes with the back of his hand. A voice called from the formal drawing room.

“Derek, is that you? Is something the matter?”

Adeline moved gracefully into the hall, a liqueur glass in one hand. Derek swallowed, and tried to master himself, before replying in a somewhat husky voice.

“No, everything is fine Auntie Adeline. I was just going to take a stroll before going to bed, if that would be OK?”

“Of course, Derek. You know you don’t have to ask.” Adeline smiled. “I like your friends. I am glad you have worked out a deal with Scott. And Stiles is adorable. I really like him. He would be a fine mate for any alpha.”

“Yes.” Derek was breathing heavily.

“It is obvious how much those two care for each other – unusual between a human and a werewolf, but not unheard of. Love like that is rare.”

“Yes.” Monosyllables seemed to be all Derek was capable of.

“You know, I wish you would find someone you could settle down with. I want to see you happy Derek. You were such a happy child, and you deserve to be happy again.” Adeline moved across and gently kissed him on the cheek. “If they made you happy, it would not matter who they were, you know. You should not be afraid of your feelings. When you meet someone you should let them know, regardless. Better to have loved and lost, then never to have loved at all.” Adeline laughed suddenly. “Listen to me, rambling on like the silly old woman I am. Go on, enjoy your stroll.” She lent in to kiss Derek again. “Be happy, Derek.”

Derek looked at her for a moment, seemingly on the brink of saying something, but when he spoke it was just to say “thanks, Auntie Adeline. I won’t be out too long.” As he pulled the front door closed behind him, Derek’s werewolf hearing picked up Stiles’s sleepy accents from the bedroom above the front porch.

“Scott, I don’t mind you being the big spoon, but if you’re going to keep nuzzling my neck like that I am going to get stubble burn, and then there will be dire retribution.”

Derek abandoned his plans for a stroll. Fangs extended, claws out, he ran. 

 

 

About half an hour later, from beyond the edges of the Garou property, there came the faint, pained howl of a wolf; too faint for anyone to hear, unless they had been listening out for it. Adeline Garou turned her head to the sound, and smiled a little ruefully. “Derek, you silly boy… Why can’t you see?” She sighed, made her way over to a small side table in the drawing room and picked up a decanter. “You deserve to be happy.”


	5. First, catch your rabbit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I LOVE YOU, YOU DUMBASS”
> 
> “Well I love you too, you annoying little…”
> 
> They stopped, panting at each other. Stiles broke the silence
> 
> “I am going to kiss you now”
> 
> “Right”
> 
> “Fine”
> 
> “Go on then”
> 
> “I will”
> 
> He did.

Stiles was almost bouncing as he came into breakfast. Saturday had been a success, dinner had been great, and he had slept well. His enthusiasm did not seem to have reached Derek however, who was sitting at the table morosely pushing half a sausage around his plate in a manner that suggested it had in some way personally offended him.

“Good morning Adeline”. 

Adeline looked up from her newspaper and returned the greeting. 

“Mornin’” Stiles did not seem to be even slightly oppressed by Derek’s demeanour. Derek looked up sullenly at the red stubble rash that seemed to be forming on the left of Stiles’s neck. He grunted unintelligibly.

“Figures you aren’t a morning person. And you aren’t an evening person either. Is there, like, a 5 minute window during the day when you are actually a little sunbeam of optimism and fun?” Stiles wandered over to the sideboard, helped himself largely to eggs and bacon, and returned to the table.

“Ignore him Stiles. He was out late last night roaming around – and he always was a grumpy little cub when he did not get enough sleep.” Adeline smiled and went back to her paper.

Shira and Scott wandered in together. Scott crossed the room to give Stiles a quick kiss – a gesture that had been carefully rehearsed back in Beacon Hills – before helping himself breakfast. Derek glared sourly at them both, as Shira slid into the seat next to him.

“Shira, dear, why don’t you take Derek and Stiles over to the lake this morning? That way Scott and I can have a nice chat on some matters of mutual interest. Then we can some coffee mid-morning, before the boys head back to Beacon Hills.”

Stiles and Derek both glanced apprehensively towards Scott, but he seemed perfectly calm. “That sounds like an excellent idea Adeline. I’m ready when you are.”

“No need to rush Scott. Finish your breakfast and come and find me in the library.”

 

Scott was entirely relaxed about his meeting with Adeline. Neither Stiles nor Derek shared his calm outlook, but both followed Shira as she led them into the woods that bordered the Garou house. The path was not that wide, and not terribly even. Shira set a pace that soon left Stiles lagging a little behind, carefully watching his step so as not to humiliate himself by falling flat on his face. Even so, he was moving fast enough to be covered in a light sheen of perspiration.

After a couple of minutes Shira had managed to link her arm through Derek’s, and was chatting away to him. Derek started by throwing out the occasional glance to Stiles as he walked behind them, but was slowly drawn in to Shira’s conversation – which stressed “do you remember when?” rather heavily. The backwards glances lessened in frequency.

“We used to come here all the time, Derek. All those summers we spent out here – the barbecues on the lake shore… I remember the first time you caught a rabbit, and brought it back for the barbecue, you were so proud.”

“It was a particularly hard rabbit to catch. And I was, what, ten? Eleven?”

Shira was stroking Derek’s arm, leaning into him. “You were the youngest ever to bring a rabbit to the family barbecue. You always were an early developer though. I remember that from the skinny dipping sessions in the lake. A very early and very impressive developer.”

Derek’s blush was visible even to Stiles, as he trailed behind. The back of Derek’s neck flushed a deep red. Stiles’s face had become set in what Scott always called the ‘Stilinski scowl’ – jaw clenched, mouth scrunched, eyebrows pulled together in an imitation of Derek’s death glare. A pale imitation of Derek’s death glare, of course, because no one could do a death glare like Derek. But still, overall an impressive display of disgruntlement. No one could look at Stiles and think he was in any way gruntled by current developments. He was clearly very far from gruntled. 

Derek muttered something which had Shira giggling. It was, of course, at precisely this moment that Stiles tripped over a tree root.

“Stiles, are you OK?” Shira’s voice was concerned, but did not seem to be entirely sincere. Stiles picked himself up, brushed the leaves off of himself, and grunted what might charitably be considered a sound of assent.

 

The trip to, around and back from the lake took nearly two hours. After Stiles’s fall Derek had checked on Stiles a bit more, and seemed to have deliberately slowed the pace of the hike somewhat, but the pace of reminiscence from Shira had not seemed to abate at all. Stiles’s expression was still far from cheerful, as the three of them made their way onto the lawn. Near the house Adeline was sitting on the terrace, alone.

“Where’s Scott?” Stiles was suddenly apprehensive.

Adeline smiled at him reassuringly. “He had a text message, some problem with one of his pack. He said it was nothing serious, but he had to dash back to sort it out. I trust it is not a problem with the Argents… I know they are around your territory. Scott said he would text you, but of course you would not have had any reception out by the lake. It is the only part of the property without decent coverage. Check your phone, you should get reception here.”

Stiles dragged out his Samsung, and almost immediately there was a beeping sound and a message from Scott flashed up. “Batman, A v sick this morning. Going back to check. All good w/ Adeline. Pls drive back with D. S.”

Stiles visibly relaxed. ‘Batman’ was code. If it was included in a text message it meant that everything was OK and the message was legitimate.

“Sit down and have some coffee” Adeline indicated the seats next to her on the terrace. “The chocolate cake is particularly good. Old family recipe. You must remember it Derek – you always asked for second helpings.”

“I’m beginning to see where the name Delly-belly came from” Stiles seemed to be more cheerful now they were back.

Shira smiled. “But it isn’t really fair now, is it? Derek’s all toned muscle these days.” She leant over Derek where he sat, playfully prodding him in his abs. Stiles’s smile disappeared from his face as if it had been wiped off by a sponge.

“Oh, Derek, I am so sorry…” Shira had spilt her coffee over Derek’s form fitting shirt. She began dabbing at Derek’s chest with a napkin (even though most of the coffee seemed to have gone elsewhere).

“Quick, Derek, take that off. I’ll get the maid to put it into soak.” Adeline was insistent in her tone. “Come on, quickly, before the stain sets.”

Derek made an inarticulate sound of protest but Adeline stood over him, hand held out expectantly. He slowly began to unbutton the shirt.

“Stiles” Adeline turned to him with a winning smile “perhaps you have a T shirt that Derek could borrow? Would you mind running upstairs to get him one?”. 

Stiles raced upstairs and down as quickly as he could but when he returned, clutching the T shirt he had worn the day before, it was to find Shira had occupied Stiles’s chair next to Derek. She was stroking Derek’s arm and looking up at him. There was a trace of her lipstick on Derek’s cheek, which Shira slowly wiped away with a napkin as Stiles sat down opposite them.

 

It had taken half an hour to get into the car. Shira had been so glued to Derek that it looked like powerful machinery would be required to break them apart, but somehow they were separated. Stiles was reserved but polite, baring his neck again to Adeline as he left and earning a “silly boy” in response. Derek had seemed unusually distracted.

The Jaguar had barely left the drive before Stiles pulled his Samsung out to call Scott.

“Scott might not be happy you calling him in front of another alpha.” Derek glanced meaningfully across at Stiles with a head jerk behind them, but then something about Stiles seemed to catch his attention. He looked back at the road with a pained expression that mingled with his more normal glower. 

Stiles fidgeted for another half an hour, until Derek finally said “we're out of their territory, they shouldn't be able to hear us either.” Stiles hit the speed dial in seconds – the phone on speaker, as Derek would be able to hear anyway.

“Dude what is it?”

“Stiles, where are you? Is everything OK? Tell me everything's alright.” Scott sounded concerned.

“Everything is fine bro. We're out of Garou territory, I’m in the car with Derek. Is everything OK with you, dashing off like that? What's the matter with Allison?”

“Allison just woke up really, really sick – I mean seriously sick. And Chris is out of town. When she texted I had to rush back. But it’s OK. It’s just a really bad case of food poisoning. My mum is with her now. I’ll be back in Beacon Hills in like, half an hour.” 

“You’re sure that’s all?”

“My mum says not to worry, it’s all cool. But you are sure things are OK with you?”

“Of course. Aside from a three hour drive with the Sourwolf”. Derek’s expression darkened, in spite of the seeming physical impossibility of that happening. 

Scott sounded relieved. “Great. Stiles, I can’t thank you enough for this weekend. No one could pull off what you did, and I couldn’t have done that with anyone else. I luv ya, bro”

“You too.”

Stiles put the phone back in the pocket of his jeans, only to jerk his head up as Derek swerved the car off the road next to a small patch of woodland.

“Derek, what the hell?”

Derek threw open the driver’s door, pushed himself out and stormed off a few paces. The Jaguar’s engine stalled to a halt, angrily. Stiles stared through the windshield at Derek, uncomprehending, before rousing himself to get out and follow.

“What? What the hell is it? Is it the Garou pack? What's gone wrong?”

Derek seemed to be muttering to himself, but then turned abruptly towards Stiles. 

“It’s you. You. I can’t do this. I can’t spend three hours in a car while you ramble on about your perfect bromance. FLAUNTING his marks on your skin, every time I look up to check the rear view mirror. I can’t do three hours in a car with you smelling like you, GOD with me smelling like you…” Derek suddenly clawed at the T shirt, which admittedly had already been showing some signs of duress at the seams under the pressure from his muscles, ripped it off his body and threw the tattered remains away from him.

“HEY!” Stiles took his T shirts very, very seriously.

“I have had to watch you making out with Scott for an entire fucking weekend, watch you all wrapped up in each other, in love with each other and I….”

Stiles stared, two bright red spots of anger appearing on his cheeks.

“I don’t see how you would have noticed, you were too busy with Shira, being kissed by Shira, being petted by Shira, reminiscing about all those times you were swimming naked with Shira. How do you think I felt having to watch that flirting going on right in front of me, buddy? It was not pleasant… OK it’s not like we’re a thing or anything but even an emotional vacuum like you must know... must have worked out….”

“WHAT? What was I supposed to work out while Scott was sticking his tongue down your throat? What the hell was I supposed to get from that?”

“IT WAS FAKE you idiot. You were there at the council meeting that set up this whole charade. And you didn’t have to come. You knew it was going to make it worse. You KNEW I had feelings for you.”

“YEAH, RIGHT.” Derek and Stiles were standing a foot apart, a few yards in front of the Jaguar, yelling at each other. “You OBVIOUSLY have feelings for me. Clearly. All the time you were with Scott you were thinking of me, I’m sure. Stop toying with me Stiles. You have ignored every attempt I have made to tell you how I felt.”

“WHAT attempts? You don’t feel anything. You stand around glowering with constant expression of disapproval and irritation and dislike whenever I'm near, and the nearest I get to communication or contact of any kind with you is when you try and wrestle the gavel away from me at BHIP-Co.”

“Of course I feel something. You aren’t oblivious. Seeing things is what you do. It is YOU who doesn’t have any feelings. You wouldn’t have enjoyed torturing me this weekend if you did. You ENJOYED making me watch you the two of you. I’ve been tortured before, but… what you did this weekend… you are cold, Stiles.”

“I… TORTURING YOU? I LOVE YOU, YOU DUMBASS”

“Well I love you too, you annoying little…”

They stopped, panting at each other. Stiles broke the silence

“I am going to kiss you now”

“Right”

“Fine”

“Go on then”

“I will”

He did.

 

The kiss started hesitantly. Stiles took a step forward, grabbed at Derek’s hair and then pulled him in close. It escalated quickly. Derek seemed to have an overpowering need, a hunger to touch and kiss as much of Stiles as he could. Stiles was acutely aware of the naked expanse of Derek’s torso, aside from a tattered shred of his T shirt that still clung to an arm. Derek manoeuvred Stiles clumsily backwards until Stiles was pressed against a convenient tree. The frantic kissing did not even seem to pause, while Derek ripped open Stiles’s shirt, pushing the fabric away.

Stiles made a moan of protest. To date it was his wardrobe that was taking the brunt of the collateral damage of this relationship. He scrabbled ineffectively at Derek’s denim clad ass, with a half formed and completely impractical idea of somehow tearing the fabric of his jeans. The result was basically an energetic groping, that slowly came to move into synch with Derek’s increasingly frantic grinding thrusts. The heat of Derek's rock hard cock could be felt through two sets of jeans. The moan and the grabbing actions Stiles had started seemed to have spurred Derek on. Stiles had just gotten a hand down the back of Derek’s jeans – because the guy had no waist at all and there was a huge gap around his waistband – and was starting to feel the taut bare flesh stretched over the powerful muscles of Derek’s ass cheeks. Danny had been right; commando. Derek started to thrust violently in a series of moves of an uncontrolled, animal like intensity. Stiles could feel the flesh moving beneath his fingers in rhythmic pushing motions.

“Ahh, ahhh, ahhhhhh”. Derek’s cries were sounding increasingly desperate, almost unwilling. Then, suddenly, stillness.

Stiles stopped his groping, and stared somewhat blankly over Derek’s shoulder into the middle distance. Derek had slumped against him, and the thrusts and indeed the kissing had come to a stop. The sudden cessation had left Stiles shocked, in a dazed kind of a way. He also felt deprived. The sensations he had been experiencing just moments before had been really, really good.

“Ummm, Derek?”

There was a sort of huffing noise in the midst of Derek’s laboured breathing that could be taken for some kind of acknowledgement.

“Derek, did you just come in your pants?”

The tips of Derek’s ears were a deep red.

“It’s been a while.”

Stiles caught his breath. “You did? I caused you to lose control and come in your pants? Oh my God that is awesome.”

Derek seemed to be trying to pull away in embarrassment.

“No, Derek, seriously, that is awesome. Have you any idea how it feels, going through life looking like me, to have someone lose control physically like that? Over me? What am I saying, of course you have no idea. People have spontaneous orgasms at the sight of your silhouette.”

“What are you going on about?”

“Uh nothing. I never spontaneously…well only once, and I was a lot younger, and… never mind. Shut up. You came in your pants.”

“I mean, do you not realise how hot you are? Seriously Stiles? If there were a list of the hottest hundred men on the planet…”

“What, I’d be number one?”

“No, Matt Bomer would be number one. But you’d be top five for sure.”

“Did you just try and make a joke? I don’t think that the man who just came in his pants is any position to make a joke.”

“If I’d known that was all it took to get you to stop with the jokes….” Derek leant in and kissed Stiles hard on the mouth with a sense of determination. He pulled away, with Stiles chasing after his retreating lips, wanting more.

“What? Why have you stopped?” 

“I am going to leave you to your own devices.”

“What? No, you can’t. You mustn’t”. Stiles was wailing, sounding ever more frantic.

“I am just standing here. You can do whatever you want to me. I won’t stop you. Someone as hot as you must be used to getting their own way. If you want to slide another hand down my jeans, for instance…”

Stiles’s other hand moved with lightening speed. Each buttock was in his grasp, and he was pulling Derek towards him. Derek moved his head towards Stiles. Stiles stopped breathing as Derek’s mouth moved to within a fraction of his own, then suddenly shifted to the side and started to whisper in Stiles’s ear.

“Do you like what you can feel Stiles?”

Stiles moaned out his assent. 

“How would you like to feel my ass underneath your body? My legs spread wide, waiting for you to claim me. Your thighs thrusting against my ass, as I tense around your cock?” Derek tensed his ass cheeks as he spoke, and Stiles’s grabbed at them frantically. “Would you like that, as you push inside me, deeper and deeper, until you come inside me, filling me up and claiming me as yours?”

Stiles moaned again.

“Or maybe” Derek slowly moved his mouth down, without touching Stiles at all, to breath over Stiles’s neck, and then across his collar bone “Maybe I should lick my way slowly down your body, tracing my tongue over each of your nipples? Biting a little at your toned chest, as I bring my mouth slowly down over your perfect abs, to the pulsing length of your cock. Maybe I should”

“Derek….” There was a pleading in Stiles’s voice, and he was frantically opening and closing his hands, gripping and ungripping Derek’s ass. “Derek, please…”

“Maybe I should” Derek continued without paying any attention “let you fuck into my mouth? Taking the whole length of your cock and sucking on it, pulling you into me as far as I can.”

Stiles moaned again, a deep, long, guttural sound of pleasure and pain blending into a single throaty note of ecstasy.

“Sucking you right down to the balls, as I gently trace a finger down the curve of your back, between your ass cheeks, and then into you as your hips push further and further into me.”

Stiles was panting as Derek’s breath ghosted across to his other ear.

“Or maybe I should ride you? Have you lying beneath me as I work up and down on your cock, while massaging your body? You only have to ask Stiles. Just ask me to do it and I would. I would strip naked and take you inside of me, letting you thrust up as I push down on top of you, and”

Any further description was cut off as Stiles pulled Derek into him, seemingly trying to exclude any possibility of a gap between them anywhere between their bodies, and pressed his mouth firmly over Derek’s. Stiles’s tongue worked its way in and out of Derek’s lips desperately as he rutted against the damp fabric of Derek’s jeans, the kiss being periodically interrupted for hungry gasps of air.

“Derek, God, DEREK….”

Stiles yelled out and then subsided into a limp, sweaty mass against Derek’s body.

“Stiles?”

Stiles did not even acknowledge Derek’s voice.

“Stiles, did you just come in your pants?”

“Fuck you, asshole.”

“That may come later Stiles. Just think. If this is what we can do when we have clothes on, imagine what we can do when we are naked.”

Derek began kissing Stiles along the jaw line, before halting just below his mouth. Deliberately, carefully, he tilted his head to one side, baring his neck to Stiles. It seemed to take Stiles a moment to realise what this was.

“Derek, do you – are you, I mean I know the theory of this but I have never…”

“Stiles. I am going to get a stiff neck if I keep standing like this.”

Stiles leant in, kissed Derek’s neck and then sucked own, biting a little. The mark retreated almost as soon as it was left, but Derek sighed out – a sound of contentment and peace. Stiles suddenly bent his head to one side – the left side, so as to expose the right side of his neck which Scott had curiously left unmarked. 

“My alpha marked the other side. I figured my mate should mark this side.”

Derek growled, and leant in.

 

Back in the car, Stiles wrestled himself into a T shirt. He forbade Derek to put on anything. They sat in silence for a moment.

“This is real?” Derek finally asked, in a slightly uncertain voice.

“God, this is real.“ Stiles was absolutely certain. ”I love you, you grumpy freak. And I made your top five list, so unless Matt Bomer comes along I figure I am safe.”

Derek huffed out a sound that seemed to be a release of tension and anxiety. He reached a hand over to gently caress Stiles’s thigh.

“Come on big guy” Stiles was grinning ridiculously at him. “Let’s get going. And I am going to tell you all the things I plan to do with you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. For starters, we are so having sex in this car.”

“Stiles. We are neither of us teenagers. We are not having sex in this car.”

“We so are.”

“We are not.”

 

Thirty miles further down the road the Jaguar swerved erratically off of the asphalt and into a clearing to the side. Derek leapt out and ran to the trunk, frantically moving the bags around until he pulled out a tartan travel rug. Slamming the trunk shut with reckless force he ran to the back door of the Jaguar, wrenched it open and flung the travel rug over the leather of the back seat, just as Stiles finally managed to disentangle himself from his seatbelt, negotiate the difficult task of extracting himself from the car seat, remove his T shirt and kick off his shoes. 

“Shoes off Derek”

“What?”

“I am not having you getting your shoes over the back seat of our car”

“Our car?”

“Oh this is so our car. Despite which, I want you completely naked before we start. I want to run my fingers over every inch of your body, to run my tongue over as many inches of your body as…”

“Get in, now”. Derek flung himself into the back of the car.


	6. The Truman Show

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles stared at Derek. “You’re joking.”
> 
> Derek looked down morosely.
> 
> “You must have made a mistake.”
> 
> Derek just shook his head, without making eye contact. “He feels something, very powerfully, for you.”
> 
> “Oh, my God.”
> 
> There was a brief silence.
> 
> “Oh. My. God.”
> 
> Another pause. 
> 
> “Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod.”
> 
> Stiles was flailing around with each cry, looking like he had been tasered by a hunter who had kept her finger on the trigger far too long.
> 
> Derek seemed to shrink in on himself, refusing to look up, crossing his arms and hunching his shoulders.
> 
> “Oh, my God.” Stiles’s mouth was open in complete shock.

The regular Thursday BHIP-Co had been cancelled. Stiles had been helping Scott and Allison move into their new home all week, while sneaking off to see Derek each evening. On Thursday morning Scott had texted to say that Allison was exhausted, and could they delay any urgent inter-pack matters until the housewarming barbecue on Saturday? Then Lydia had called, and in a croaky voice said she was feeling rough and would not be able to make it that evening. Danny had also made some excuse – although Stiles had been convinced he had caught sight of Danny and Isaac taking what looked (to Stiles’s trained eye) like champagne bottles to the recycling on Thursday morning when he was driving through town. He had caught sight of a sunglasses wearing Lydia accompanied by a wan looking Allison emerging from a drug store as well – or at least, he thought he had. Stiles had a fleeting thought that they might have been all out drinking the night before, but then remembered that Wednesday was Scott and Allison’s salsa night, and that Isaac worked late at Deaton’s (technically Deaton and McCall’s now) on Wednesday and then had a quiet night with Danny. Lydia worked on her doctoral dissertation on Wednesdays. It had enabled him to spend the night at Derek’s loft – a gloriously uninterrupted night of tangled limbs, twisted bedclothes, and chocolate ice cream. 

They had stayed apart on Thursday night, though texted each other frequently. On Friday Derek called to say that Isaac was staying at Danny’s. Stiles drove over as fast as the jeep would take him and flung himself up the stairs to Derek’s loft. Derek’s first, passionate greeting had not allowed them to move much from the front door, and eventually led to them both lying, panting, on a rug in front of the couch, temporarily sated and wonderfully naked.

“So what would you normally be doing on a Friday? You know, if you weren’t doing me.”

Derek had been tracing abstract designs on Stiles’s stomach with his fingers. He paused, and leant in for a kiss. “Hmmm?”

“Come on, what did you used to do on a Friday? Are you, in fact, a drag queen at Jungle?”

Derek snorted with laughter. “No. It will sound silly…”

Stiles waited expectantly.

“… I used to run round the territory, check everything was OK. And… every once in a while I would stop by your house, sit outside your window for a bit. Just to check you were OK. That you had gotten back from wherever you had been in one piece. Just to be sure. Nothing creepy or anything.”

“Damn it…” Stiles was astounded. “Scott wins the sweepstake.”

Derek looked at him questioningly. Stiles smiled at him and then slowly dragged his hand up the inside of Derek’s thigh.

 

 

Stiles and Derek drove together to Scott and Allison’s housewarming barbecue – car pooling would be a good excuse for the mingling of their scents. Stiles had insisted that this would be the best time to tell the two packs that he and Derek were an item – when everyone was together, in a social setting, but with enough people around that no one would wolf out if anyone got odd about it. Stiles was pretty confident everyone would be cool with it, but he liked to plan for all eventualities. As Derek’s Jaguar drove through the suburbs, however, Stiles’s nervousness seemingly increased.

“Everyone will be so surprised when we tell them, won’t they? I mean, it was a surprise to us, so it is bound to be a huge shock to them. But I think everyone will be OK with it, when they get over the surprise. I’ll have to make it clear to Scott I am staying in his pack, because seriously? I don’t think he could cope without me in his pack. I’ll speak to him first, somewhere private, so he does not freak out. But you are cool with the different pack thing, aren’t you. I mean you said you were OK with that, that it was not unheard of to have a mate in a different pack. Mate as in werewolf mate, not as in British mate, and why do the British use mate like that anyway? Isn’t it weird? I hope Scott won’t be weird, I don’t think he will be, in fact he might suspect already. Scott’s always been very intuitive on shit like this, and he knows me better than anyone, so he might suspect. But everyone else will be so surprised. Won’t they? Derek?”

Derek had been quiet throughout Stiles’s nervous, rambling monologue. He pulled into a parking spot a little way down the street from Scott and Allison’s new home, and got out. Stiles scrambled out of his seat with a little less elegance.

“You DO think they will be OK, right? I mean, surprised, but once they adjust to the idea?”

“Stiles”.

Derek’s face was sombre, his eyes downcast.

“What? Don’t tell me you think we have a problem. It won’t change things for the packs, will it? I mean” Stiles broke off and gulped nervously “I will still be able to chair BHIP-Co, won’t I? It just emphasises my impartiality. And I have a gavel and everything. They won’t…” another gulp "They won’t try and take my gavel away from me, will they? Because that would be just wrong. I might be prepared to concede the glasses, I only really wore the glasses because you seemed to look at me more when I wore the glasses, I don’t really need the glasses now that I know you will look at me when I am not wearing the glasses, so I don’t mind losing the glasses, but I am not giving up the gavel without a fight because…”

“Stiles.” Derek was seemingly dealing with some internal struggle. “I… I have to tell you something. I have been keeping it secret all week, and I don’t want a relationship built on secrets. That… that did not end well for me in the past. So I have to tell you. Even if you decide to…”

Derek tailed off, and kicked at the kerb stone with the toe of his shoe.

“Derek, what is it? You can tell me anything, you know that.“ Stiles sounded seriously concerned. Derek had never behaved like this before. This was a whole new level of angst.

“When we were at Adeline’s…” Derek paused again. “Last Saturday night. When you and Scott were talking in your room”

“Our brilliant amateur dramatics you mean? Sure.”

“When you were getting into bed, I… Scott… I…” Derek looked down at his shoes. “I could smell arousal on Scott. Serious arousal – I mean strong enough that I could smell it in the room next door. Scott might have wanted the fake boyfriend thing to be a bit more real. It was what pushed me over the edge, into being as jealous as I was.”

Stiles stared at Derek. “You’re joking.”

Derek looked down morosely.

“You must have made a mistake.”

Derek just shook his head, without making eye contact. “He feels something, very powerfully, for you.”

“Oh, my God.”

There was a brief silence.

“Oh. My. God.”

Another pause. 

“Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod.”

Stiles was flailing around with each cry, looking like he had been tasered by a hunter who had kept her finger on the trigger far too long.

Derek seemed to shrink in on himself, refusing to look up, crossing his arms and hunching his shoulders.

“Oh, my God.” Stiles’s mouth was open in complete shock.

Derek made a small sound of distress. “I know how much he means to you, and now you know what he wants I won’t stand in your way. I just want you to be happy Stiles, and if that means you are with Scott then I hope I can be the better wolf about it and…” Derek made a choking sound and subsided into silence.

“Oh, my God” Stiles strode over to Derek in two long steps and hit him on the side of his arm. “Ow. You muscle bound freak. I love you. How many times do I have to tell you? Do I need to bare my neck again? Here.” Stiles pulled his shirt to one side. “I'm with you. No one else.”

“But Scott loves you. And you love Scott.” Derek looked up with a dawning expression of hope, but still seemingly determined to inflict as much pain on himself as he could.

“Yes, Scott loves me. And I love Scott as a brother. Although that could be subject to some revision this afternoon.” Stiles’s mouth formed a grim line of determination. “There's nothing like that between us.”

“But, I smelt…” Derek’s self-flagellation seemed to know no limits.

“Give me ten minutes”. The grim determination was set on Stiles’s face. “I’ll have a quick chat with Scott. And then everything will be OK.” Stiles pulled Derek’s face up and kissed him. “I love you, you stupid alpha. You're my mate. Remember that.”

Derek returned the kiss with some animation. “I don’t deserve you.”

Stiles hit him again. “You deserve me. I’m your punishment for years of being a grouchy, anti-social wolf. Now give me ten minutes to have a nice bro to bro chat with Scott.”

Derek could not understand the harsh tone to Stiles’s voice. “Go easy on him. Stiles, he can’t help what he feels. And it was a powerful scent.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Stiles strode purposefully towards the house.

 

“Allison”. Stiles’s cry was one of delight as he pulled her into a hug. “Congratulations”.

Allison gave Stiles a one armed hug, carefully holding an open bottle of wine in her other hand. “Stiles, thank for all your help moving in. We couldn’t have done it without you – and the Jeep, of course.”

Stiles kissed her quickly on the cheek as he broke away. “Great music too”. He moved restlessly, out of time to the beat. “You and Scott should give a demonstration of your salsa dancing. After over two months of practice you must be really good at it.” Allison looked a little evasive at that. 

“And there’s my best bro. Scott, buddy…”. He pulled Scott into a sideways hug. “I am so pleased for you two. And everything worked out last weekend too.”

Scott seemed to be trying to scent Stiles subtly, and his face suddenly broke into a huge smile. “Well, of course. I can’t think of anyone else I would want as my fake boyfriend.” 

“That’s because we’re best bros.” Stiles reached across with his free hand and punched Scott lightly on his shoulder. “No secrets between us. Never have been. Never will be.”

“Ow, ow, ow, ow, OW”. Scott was writhing in pain. Stiles had grabbed at his nipple through his T shirt and was twisting it. 

“You set Derek and I up, you fucker.” Stiles managed to the seemingly impossible task of hissing a sentence containing only a single sibilant. 

“Ow, ow, ow.” Scott broke free and dodged behind Allison. “How did you find out?”

“Derek said he smelt arousal. And there is no arousal. I know. I know everything about you Scotty boy. I know you better than you know yourself. I know you are not in the slightest bit interested in me in that way.”

“Ha!” Scott gave a triumphant cry and then dodged around Allison as Stiles made a grab for him. “I told you the arousal thing would be a step too far.” Scott looked at Allison with the air of a werewolf who has just won a bet.

“It worked, didn’t it?” Allison was calm, as Scott and Stiles charged around her like she was a maypole. “Boys, behave. The outcome was what everyone wanted.”

Stiles was panting heavily, unable to catch Scott. “I don’t even want to know how you got the aroused scent – Oh, my God, it was on your pyjamas right? You must have…Before we even left Beacon Hills…. All over them, and it had to have been more than once…And you SNUGGLED me wearing those…Ugh… no, no, no, I don’t want you to be snuggling me when you had… God, no. I am just not going to think about it. Just how far did this conspiracy go? I mean, I know you two have been working on it for over two months, and Adeline had to be in on it, but…”

Stiles was interrupted by Derek, who came charging up to them. “The Garous. They’re here. Scott, kiss Stiles, quickly. Scent mark him. Allison, where's your dad? Come with me. Adeline might not follow my scent. Where’s Chris? Quickly, there isn't much time…”

From the other side of the garden the cut glass accents of Adeline’s voice could be heard. “Allison, there you are…” and Adeline Garou was striding towards them, before pulling Allison into an embrace. “A lovely house you have here. And you are looking gorgeous as always.”

“Adeline, I’m so pleased you could come. It's lovely to see you again” Allison was all smiles. 

Derek stared at them, mouth agape. He was huffing out little gasps and puffs, and exhibiting all the surprise and bewilderment of a wolf who, while in search of a pork roast, has been confronted by a house constructed in brick to the highest building code standard. Small sounds of incomprehension began escaping from him.

“We were set up.” Stiles was trying to maintain a steady tone to his voice while making a sudden grab for Scott again. “It was a huge conspiracy, the sort of thing Rush Limbaugh keeps going on about, although perhaps with a slightly different outcome compared to the Rush Limbaugh conspiracies. Although for all I know Rush Limbaugh thinks man on man loving is a government conspiracy. Not the point. There was a vast conspiracy to get you and I together in sexytimes, people have been conspiring on all sides. Nothing is real. It is the Truman Show. The whole fake boyfriend thing was fake. They have been planning it for at least two months.” He paused. “But this is too elaborate for Scott. It would require a criminal genius to plan this much detail. What am I saying? It would require me to plan this much detail. And there's only one person….” Stiles suddenly turned, raised his arm to shoulder height and pointed with a dramatic flourish at Lydia, who was standing a little way off.

“J’accuse”.

“Oh, seriously, sweetie, why are you even pretending to be surprised? Of course I chaired the DSSS.” She waved a congratulatory champagne flute towards Stiles and Derek. “Every Wednesday. And of course, it worked. My plan was flawless, down to the smallest detail.” She spotted one of Allison’s young male co-workers across the lawn. “Hmmm… well, chat later.” 

“DSSS?” Derek was uncomprehending, and seemed to be grasping for random points for elaboration. 

“Derek and Stiles Sexytimes Subcommittee. Of BHIP-Co.” Allison provided the answer. “It was an attempt to get you two to realise how right you were for each other.” She glanced at Stiles, who seemed to be seething, throwing malevolent, glowering looks in Scott’s direction where he cowered behind Allison. “Scott, why don’t you go and check everyone has enough to drink” she handed him the wine bottle “and take Derek and Adeline with you. You alphas can all bond together. I’ll have a quick chat with Stiles.”

Scott gratefully ducked away with Adeline, keeping a careful distance between himself and Stiles and dragging Derek with him.

Stiles, meanwhile, caught sight of his father by the barbecue, hot dog in hand. “Aha.” The cry was accusatory.

“What? Kiddo, it’s a barbecue. And it’s my first hotdog. I’ll have salad as well.”

“Yeah, well, enjoy the meat while you can, father-mine. It's tofu for a month for you. I know you were involved. I know someone turned the traffic lights green so I could get to Derek’s apartment in time to see him… My God, I was pimped out by my own father. Two months of tofu. Three. And herbal tea only.”

The Sheriff looked pleadingly at Allison, as Stiles ratcheted up the horrors he would inflict by way of punishment. Allison had meanwhile signalled to Lydia to provide reinforcements. Lydia strode over, seemingly able to make high heels work on the rough grass of Scott and Allison’s lawn. They each linked an arm with Stiles, and frog marched him to a quiet corner of the garden.

“So” Lydia began “Why all the theatrics? Are you not happy to be with Derek?”

“It isn’t that” Allison was quietly stroking Stiles’s arm “It is what Scott was worried about. Isn’t it?” She turned to Stiles. “Since the whole thing with Gerard” there was a faint flush on Allison’s face “Scott promised you that he would never keep anything from you.”

“He broke the bro code”. Stiles 

Lydia looked pityingly at him. “Stiles. Sweetie. Scott was really resistant because of that. I can’t tell you how much effort it was to keep him in line at the DSSS. I almost broke my gavel keeping him in order.”

“You have a gavel?” Stiles seemed even more offended.

“Well, just a small gavel. And I don’t wield it with quite the authority that you do.”

“It’s all in the arm. You need plenty of follow-through with the wrist. But that’s not the point. He broke the code.”

“Stiles.” Allison was pleading. “It took nearly a month to persuade him that it had to be kept a secret from you as well as from Derek. And you remember why Scott said he was doing this.”

Stiles pondered a moment. “He said he was doing it for love. But that was because it was supposed to be about you. He had to pretend it was about love.”

“Stiles, Stiles, Stiles.” Lydia was smiling fondly at him in a slightly superior manner. “We couldn’t lie. None of us could lie. Derek would have picked up on it. Everything over the past couple of months has been carefully thought out and scripted. The number of times we rehearsed the dialogue for that BHIP-Co meeting with Adeline’s letter – you would not believe. When Scott said he was creating this situation for love, he meant it. It was his love for you. And you know what a sap that boy is – no offence Allison.”

“None taken. It’s how I like him.”

“But, the whole hunter thing... Your history with the Garou.” 

“We do have a history, and it means what it normally means in my family. We have a history of an amicable treaty based on the hunters’ code. And I could say I would not be welcome at the Garous because Adeline told me I would not be welcome if my presence prevented you and Derek getting together. Not a word of a lie.”

“Scott provided the inside information on you” Allison went on, a little apprehensively “and Isaac was the inside information on Derek. Including the optimal time for you to pay a visit to the loft. There was an elaborate text network. Isaac texted something benign to Danny, who texted a random comment to Scott, who contacted me to contact the Sheriff to make sure the road to Derek’s was clear – just in case you saw Scott’s message history. It was your ‘Batman’ code setup that gave us the idea.”

Stiles looked a little mollified that they had taken inspiration from his organisation and planning.

“And Scott had strict instructions as to how he was to mark you.” Lydia continued, triumphant with the success of her plan. “He had to mark the left side – he would keep forgetting that in practice. Poor Danny and Isaac ended up with marks all over the place – we had to stop using Danny for practice, because it was taking so long for him to heal. They had to keep reminding Scott to aim for the left side. That way the mark would be highly visible to Derek when he drove you home – I knew that would drive him nuts. We had to make sure that you were somewhere without cell phone reception on Sunday morning so that Scott leaving without you would not seem suspicious, and Adeline made sure that Shira flirted with Derek, and spilled the coffee over him later on Sunday, so he would have to wear one of your T shirts. And you had to run to get the shirt right after a hike in the woods in order to maximise your scent, right before a three hour drive home. That plus the arousal thing” Stiles looked horrified again “was enough to push the pair of you over the edge into admitting what you felt for each other.”

“And Scott and I had to go salsa dancing a couple of times, so it would not be a lie to say that we did. Though of course Wednesday evenings were generally really DSSS meetings - apart from the celebratory party this Wednesday, once we knew we had pulled it off... Scott was terrible at salsa, worse than ice skating; honestly I thought we were going to be expelled from the class at one point.”

“We could have just found it out ourselves”. Stiles was trying to push back.

“Seriously? No one has that much time.” Lydia again looked pityingly at Stiles. “You are a complete Failstiles, and Derek is a complete Failwolf when it comes to relationships. You needed a little nudge. And my brilliant planning was the nudge that was needed.”

Stiles chewed at his lower lip with a slightly less malevolent expression. “Why? Why go to all this trouble. I mean I’m glad, ecstatic even, that Derek and I are together, but…”

Allison looked at him. “Scott really wanted you to be happy. It seemed to be really important to him that you find the person you were meant to be with, and for some reason he wanted it to happen sooner rather than later. You know how he feels about you. I always feel I am sharing Scott with you…” She smiled. “Just not quite as much as the fake boyfriend idea might suggest.”

“That’s why you and I would never have worked, Stiles.” Lydia was smiling too. “You know I don’t share, and it is clear whoever ends up with you has only part ownership. But Derek seems adaptable. We just had to make sure it happened. And, brilliant though the planning was, I have to say I am glad it is over. Not just because you two got it together, although that’s great of course, but the scheming and the scripted conversations and the carefully coordinated accidental meetings…” Lydia took a delicate swig of her champagne “it has been simply exhausting, I can tell you. Military campaigns have taken less effort to arrange.”

Over in the distance Stiles could see Derek being chastised by Adeline – presumably making the same points. Scott was nowhere to be seen. Stiles’s expression underwent a sudden change.

“You took all this much effort, for us?”

“Of course.” Allison patted him on the cheek. “You know how important you are to all of us. Now why don’t you go and kiss and make up with Scott. The poor boy will be sitting somewhere with his tail between his legs. Just go easy on the kiss part, hmm? There is no need to pretend anymore.”

Stiles hugged Lydia and Allison in turn, and marched over to Derek, who was just disentangling himself from an embrace with Adeline.

“Are you up to speed?” Stiles was business like.

“Ummm. Yes? I think?” Derek was cautious.

“Well good. If everyone went to this much trouble to get us together, it would be a shame to spoil the ending. And Lydia would never forgive us.” Stiles sprang at Derek, who caught him in his arms. “I feel our romance needs a bit more Scooby Doo”. With that he took Derek’s head between his hands and kissed him passionately. Applause broke out around them, along with an audible “finally” from Peter.

Derek eventually set Stiles down, flushed and bashful. Stiles caught sight of Isaac standing hand in hand with Danny in the background, looking pleased and apprehensive at the same time

“Now, you need to go and pat Isaac on the head a couple of times, and tell him he was a good boy. He looks really nervous about conspiring against his alpha. Give him an ear rub or something. But don’t run away. I just need to break up with my fake fake boyfriend”. Stiles kissed Derek on the tip of his nose.

“Stiles, he was doing what he thought best…” Derek seemed seriously concerned.

“Don’t worry. I know…” Stiles moved off slowly dragging Derek a little of the way towards the house with him and sneaking in another quick kiss. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

 

 

Scott was sitting in the kitchen, looking down at the floor and chewing on his lip in a worried sort of a way. He looked up apprehensively when Stiles came in.

“Have you forgiven me?” he asked quickly, looking at Stiles with the full force of pleading puppy eyes.

“If I say ‘no’ then you will know it’s a lie, won’t you?” Stiles staggered back as Scott suddenly threw himself at him and wrapped his arms around him.

“Dude, I hated not being able to say anything. I really tried to come up with a different way, so I wouldn’t have to keep things from you. But you know Lydia, it was impossible to come up with a better plan than hers. And it worked, right? You are happy, aren’t you? I mean you guys are so right for each other, and…”

Stiles’s reply was muffled by the all-enveloping hug. “Bro, need some air”. The pressure lessened somewhat. “I know. And I am glad how it all turned out. Even if you did break the bro code. Perhaps I should retaliate…”

Scott hung his head a little.

“Perhaps the world needs to know how avid a collector of ‘My Little Pony Ponyville’ you really were at eight years old.”

Scott looked up horrified, but then hung his head. “I’d deserve that.”

Stiles looked at him; Scott’s whole body language screamed misery and remorse. Stiles relented. He was not proof against Scott when he behaved like this. “No, no you wouldn’t. And I know why you did what you did, and I am really glad you did what you did. Really, really glad. I’ll keep that particular equine secret for a better occasion.”

Scott suddenly hugged him again, before stepping back.

“If you are really OK with things, and now that you have found who you were meant to be with, I have something to ask you, and I really hope you will say yes because I can’t do this without your help.”

“Were you waiting for me to find someone before you asked her? Dude, seriously, that is just plain dumb. I would always be happy for you, even if I hadn’t found Derek. And hadn’t you better ask Allison first, before asking me?”

Scott looked confused. “What? No. Wait. How did you know? Is it that obvious? Does Allison know?”

“Dude, chill. I know you too well. And either that is a ring box in your pocket or you're very pleased to see me…and I really don’t want to continue that train of thought. But of course Allison will say yes, and of course I will give the best best man’s speech ever – it will be hilarious from start to finish.“ Scott looked very nervous again. “And fortunately for you, you are about to be around $500 richer which will help with the expense.”

Scott looked momentarily confused at the last reference, but then pulled Stiles into another hug. “Dude. I had to ask you before Allison. You have to give me away…”

“You do know that’s not how it works, Scotty? I mean, I’m just checking. A Stiles is for life, not just for Christmas. You are stuck with me.”

“… and make sure I turn up at the right time, and that I don’t freak out. Because we both know I might freak out. Plus you promised me when we were twelve, and we had that big pillow fight, and you came out as bi. You said you'd be my best man as I was into girls. You know I'll do the same for you, I said I would back then and now you're able get married too if you want, so I'll do the same thing if you want me to when the time comes.” 

There was a pause for mutual, manly backslapping. 

“You are still going to find some awful, awful way to pay me back for the whole deliberate fake boyfriend thing, aren’t you?”

“Hell, yeah.”

“luv ya”

“luv ya too, buddy”

No heart stutter. More manly hugging.

There was a sudden noise behind them.

“Hey, you are supposed to share now” Derek growled.

 

 

Fin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who took the time to leave kudos, or who made the effort to comment. It is all much appreciated. I have always liked the fake boyfriend trope, and wanted to try something along those lines. This is no "Gravity's got nothing on you" of course, but I hope people enjoyed it. It was fun to write.
> 
>  
> 
> There are some British references in the text, for which apologies. In the interests of trans-Atlantic cooperation…
> 
> Aloysius was the teddy bear of Sebastian Flyte in Brideshead Revisited. I always thought Scott and Stiles have a relationship similar to Flyte and Ryder in the book (in the early chapters, at least).
> 
> The Jaguar Mark II (in burgundy) was Inspector Morse’s car in the British detective television series “Morse”. Daniel Sharman had a role in the sequel to “Morse”, called “Lewis” (not a terribly big role, he ends up as a corpse), which is why Isaac is so into the programs. Obviously Derek only bought the car because Stiles was so enthusiastic about it, though it is a fantastic car.
> 
> Uncle Albert, Rodney and Cassandra were characters in the British sitcom “Only Fools and Horses” whose main character was called Derek, known as Del or Del-boy- hence Delly-belly. Derek and Rodney also famously appeared dressed in fancy dress as Batman and Robin in the program.
> 
> Dylan O’Brien ranked number 5 in the Logo Hot 100 list (beating Tyler Hoechlin, who was ranked number 9). Matt Bomer was number 1.
> 
> Jeff Davies said in the DVD of S2 that when Dylan O’Brien goes too far with the physical comedy of Stiles, they refer to it on set as ‘too much Scooby Doo’. 
> 
> “A dog is for life, not just for Christmas” is the slogan of the UK’s Dogs Trust charity (formerly the National Canine Defence League) – hence the “A Stiles is for life, not just for Christmas”


End file.
